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THE GENESIS 






THE AMERICAN CHURCH 



BY 






WILLIAM C. POPE, M. D. 






New York 
JAMES POTT & COMPANY 

114 Fifth Avenue 
1894 



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Copyrighted 1894. 

BY 

WILLIAM C. POPE. 



PREFACE. 



THE Twenty-fifth Anniversary of the Dedication of the 
Church of the Good Shepherd, St. Paul, Minn., was celebrated 
September 25th, 1894. On that occasion the American flag 
was raised on a permanent staff in the churchyard, with 
appropriate ceremonies, indicative that de jure the Protestant 
Episcopal Church is the National Church. At the conclusion 
of the services of the day, a purse of gold was presented to the 
Rector of the parish, the author of this essay. The purse was 
made up for the most part by the Bishop of the Diocese, and 
the Clergy and Laity of St. Paul and Minneapolis. It has been 
chiefly used to publish this pamphlet, and to its contributors 
this essay is respectfully and affectionately inscribed. 

The purpose of the essay is to show that the Protestant 
Episcopal Church in the United States is identical with the 
Church of the Apostles in the first century. To do this, the 
history of the Church of England will be given, and then the 
connection of the Episcopal Church with the English Church. 



THE GENESIS OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH. 



THE CELTIC PERIOD. 

A CHARTER is a legal instrument conferred by a sovereign 
upon a number of people, constituting them a corporation, pos- 
sessed of certain rights. The East India Company and Hudson 
Bay Company are instances in point. The value of a charter 
is illustrated in the case of the Connecticut Colony resisting the 
officers of the king in their attempt to deprive it of its charter. 
Two kinds of corporations, open and close, are created by 
charter. The peculiarity of a close corporation is, that when 
a member, either through death or otherwise, drops out, his 
place is filled by election, by the remaining members. 

The greatest charter ever conferred by sovereign upon a 
body of men was that bestowed by the King of kings upon the 
Eleven Apostles. It is in these words : " All power is given 
unto me in Heaven and earth. Go ye therefore and make 
disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the 
Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost ; teaching 
them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you, 
and lo! I am with you always to the end of the world. 
Amen." 

The Apostolic corporation thus constituted was to be per- 
petual — " I am with you always." It was to increase in num- 
bers, until it should fill the world. " Go ye into all the world." 
In accordance with the intention of their charter, the Apostles' 
first act, on their return to Jerusalem, after the Lord's ascen- 



6 THE GENESIS OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH 

sion, was to choose and ordain one to take the place of Judas 
Iscariot. The Apostolic College was afterwards enlarged by 
the addition of the apostles Barnabas and Saul. 

The first Christians abode in the apostolic fellowship, which 
consisted, in the case of the clergy, in being united to the 
apostolic corporation by ordination, and by the sacraments, in 
the case of the laity. 

The Church thus constituted spread far and wide during the 
first century, and with reason is thought to have penetrated 
the British Isles. Clement, spoken of in the Epistle to the 
Romans, affirms that the Apostle Paul travelled to the " fur- 
thest limits of the West," a phrase which, in the literature of 
that day, included Britain. Tertullian, about the year 200, 
speaks of " those British districts hitherto inaccessible to the 
Romans, but subjugated to Christ." According to Origen, in 
the 3d century, " the power of God the Saviour is even with 
those who live in Britain." Eusebius, about 340, writes, 
" That some (of the Apostles) should reach the extremities of 
the inhabited world, and that others should cross the ocean to 
the isles called Britannic, I no longer think to be the work of 
mere man." 

The well-known St. Alban was a martyr of the British 
Church. Alban was a pagan in whose house a priest took 
refuge. They exchanged clothing, and the priest escaped, but 
Alban was apprehended in his stead and martyred. British 
bishops attended the councils of Aries, 314, Sardica,347, Arimi- 
nium, 359, and the language of St. Athanasius indicates that 
the British Church was represented at the General Council of 
Nice. 

Britain does not appear to have been affected by the great 
heresies of the Primitive Church, but originated a heresy of its 
own, which spread as far as Asia. Morgan, or, as his name 
was in Latin, Pelagius, taught that the sin of Adam was not 
hereditary, and that man can, of his own free will, unassisted 
by grace, do right. 

The British Church, disturbed by the teaching of Pelagius, 
sought help from the Church of France, whereupon Germanus, 



THE CELTIC PERIOD. 7 

bishop of Auxerre, and Lupus of Troyes were deputed to visit 
Britain, where they were successful in eradicating the Pelagian 
heresy. 

The Celtic Liturgy was akin to that of the Church of France, 
which came from Ephesus, and so from the Apostle John. 
The Gallican Liturgy was introduced into Britain by Germanus 
and Lupus. 

During the occupation of Britain by the Roman legions 
which lasted until 418, a high degree of civilization existed in 
and around the Roman cities. In one of them, York, Con- 
stantine the Great, the first Christian emperor, was proclaimed 
Csesar by the legionaries. A peculiarity of the British Church, 
was its great number of bishops, as many as one hundred and 
nineteen being found at a single council. 

At the beginning of the Christian era the northwestern 
part of Europe was occupied by the Celtic race, now repre- 
sented by the southern Irish, and the Highland Scotch. Dur- 
ing the fifth century the Teutonic races passed westward, and 
in England drove the British into Cornwall, Wales and the 
northwestern counties of England. The civilization and Chris- 
tianity of central and eastern England disappeared, and the 
heathen barbarism of the Angles, Saxons and Jutes prevailed in 
their place. The king of Kent, at the end of the sixth cen- 
tury, the powerful Ethelbert, married Bertha, daughter of 
the king of Paris. It had been stipulated that she was to be 
allowed the free exercise of the Christian faith, and in going 
to England was accompanied by the bishop Luidhard. King 
Ethelbert gave her the old Celtic church of St. Martin which 
is yet to be seen near Canterbury. Up to this time, the Church 
of Rome had not a shadow of influence in England. What 
the position of the bishop of Rome was, at this time, in the 
Church Catholic, is thus stated in the 28th canon of the Gen- 
eral Council of Chalcedon held in 45 1 : 

" We, following in all things the decisions of the holy fathers, 
and acknowledging the canon of the 1 50 most religious bishops, 
which has just been read, do also determine and decree the 
same things respecting the privileges of the most holy city 



8 THE GENESIS OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH. 

of Constantinople, the new Rome. For the fathers properly 
gave the primacy to the throne of the elder Rome, because 
that was the imperial city. And the 1 50 most religious bishops 
being moved with the same intention, gave equal privileges 
to the most holy throne of new Rome ; judging with reason, 
that the city which was honored with the sovereignty and 
senate, and which enjoyed equal privileges with the elder 
royal Rome, should also be magnified, like her, in ecclesiastical 
matters, and be second after her." The General Council of 
Chalcedon while giving the bishop of Rome a primacy of honor, 
gives to the bishop of Constantinople an equality of authority. 
The Council of Sardica, 347, a council of western Europe only, 
conferred upon the bishop of Rome authority to appoint bishops 
who should hear appeals. This was the starting-point of papal 
supremacy. The difference between primacy and supremacy 
is to be noted. 

In the latter part of the sixth century, some fair-haired York- 
shire lads attracted the attention of Abbot Gregory in the 
slave-market in Rome. On being told they were Angles, he 
said they must be changed into angels. " From what province 
are they ? " he questioned. " From Deira," was the reply. 
" They must be saved, de ira Dei," (from the wrath of God), said 
he. " Who is their king ? " " Ella." " He must be taught to 
sing Alleluia," said Gregory. He was anxious to go to England, 
but was not permitted. When he became bishop of Rome, he 
entrusted the mission to Augustine, " a swarthy monk, whose 
somewhat arrogant demeanor was not condoned by an unusual 
ability." His band, consisting of forty monks, proceeded to 
Canterbury, where Ethelbert appointed a day for an interview. 
The missionaries appeared in solemn procession, carrying a silver 
cross and a picture of the Saviour, and singing a Litany for 
the salvation of the heathen to the chants of Gregory. On 
Whitsunday, 597, the king was baptized, and at his bidding 
10,000 of his subjects followed his example. Augustine was 
consecrated at Aries in France, archbishop of the English. 
Bishops were also consecrated for London, Rochester and York. 

Augustine was puzzled to know what were to be his relations 



THE CEL TIC PERIOD. 9 

to the native Church. " Whereas there is but one faith, why 
are there different customs in different countries ? " he wrote to 
Gregory, " and why is one custom of masses observed in the 
holy Roman Church, and another in the Gallican Church ? How 
are we to deal with the bishops of France and Britain ? " 

" Over the bishops of France," replied Gregory, " we give 
you no authority, because the bishop of Aries received the pall 
in ancient times from my predecessor, and we ought by no 
means to deprive him of the authority he has received ; but 
as to all the bishops of Britain, we commit them to your care, 
that the unlearned may be taught, the feeble strengthened by 
persuasion, and the perverse corrected by authority." With 
regard to uniformity in ritual Gregory wrote wisely : " If you 
have found anything in the Roman, Gallican or any other 
Church which may be pleasing to Almighty God, select it care- 
fully and sedulously." 

The British bishops would by no means recognize the author- 
ity of the bishop of Rome, and Augustine having visited them, 
departed from them in anger. Within ten years the work of 
the Italian mission to the Anglo-Saxons of England was swept 
away, except in Kent, and the people had relapsed into heath- 
enism. 

In the seventh century there were several Anglo-Saxon king- 
doms, of which the chief were Northumbria in the northeast 
of England, Mercia in the middle, and Kent on the south- 
east. 

When Augustine came to England, he landed on the isle of 
Thanet, off the southeast coast. 

Our story leads us to an island north and west of England, 
called Iona. It is only three miles in length by one in breadth, 
" but here for centuries was the central fire of northern Christi- 
anity kept burning." Columba, an Irishman of princely bear- 
ing and descent, early gave himself to mission work in his own 
country, but in 563, with twelve like-minded companions, 
crossed the sea to Iona. He first erected an humble monastery, 
and then devoted himself to the evangelization of the neighbor- 
ing country. He had a great love for the Holy Scriptures, and 



io THE GENESIS OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH. 

spent much time in its study and in prayer. The day before 
he died he ascended a hill overlooking the monastery farm, which 
he gave his blessing. Returning to his hut, he resumed his 
daily task of transcribing, and continued to the passage, 
" They that seek the Lord shall not lack anything that is good." 
He then lay down for the night. When the bell rang for 
matins, he hastened to the altar, and before the brethren could 
join him had fainted. Unable to speak, he made a feeble effort 
to raise his hand in blessing, and so, with joy beaming on his 
countenance, passed away. He died in the year 597, the same 
as that in which Augustine came to England. 

From Iona, missionaries went forth to Scotland, to the con- 
tinent and to Iceland. About the year 634, Oswald, a prince 
educated by Scottish monks, came to the throne of Northumbria. 
He sent to Iona for a missionary to rescue his subjects from 
Paganism. The meek and holy Aidan came, who fixed his see 
in Lindisfarne, or Holy Isle, over against the extreme north- 
eastern coast of England. He summoned to his aid a band of 
Scottish monks, through whose efforts Northumbria was con- 
verted. At the Northumbrian court, Prince Paeda of Mercia be- 
came a Christian, and took home with him four missionaries, 
who were very successful in converting the Mercians. 

Oswy, the successor of Oswald, persuaded the king of Essex 
to embrace the faith, and by him a bishop was established in 
London. The greater part of the Anglo-Saxons, as appears 
from this review, were converted by Celtic missionaries. 

The two great missionary schools, the Celtic and the Roman, 
divided Great Britain between them. The Celtic school con- 
trolled Wales, Cornwall, Scotland, and Eastern, Western, North- 
ern and Central England. The papal school had its head-quar- 
ters at Canterbury. The Celtic school stood for national inde- 
pendence and primitive simplicity in religion. The Roman 
school stood for papal primacy (not yet supremacy in the modern 
sense), higher civilization and organization, and more intimate 
union with the Church throughout the world. Union with 
Rome, at this time, was an advantage, and not, as it afterwards 
became, a curse. 



THE CELTIC PERIOD. II 

The Roman and Celtic systems came into collision at the 
Northumbrian court, the very centre of Celtic Ecclesiastical 
power. The Celtic Church was accustomed to observe Easter 
in accordance with a cycle received from the missionaries, by 
whom Christianity had first been preached in Britain. 

The Roman missionaries kept Easter, in accordance with a 
more correct cycle of later date. King Oswy celebrated his 
Easter according to the Celtic mode, while his wife, who was a 
daughter of the king of Kent, observed hers in accordance with 
the Roman calendar, and so while one part of the court feasted, 
the other fasted. The Council of Whitby was held in 664, to 
decide whether the Celtic or the Roman custom should be 
adopted. The papal school gained the victory, as it was repre- 
sented that St. Peter held the keys of the kingdom of heaven, 
and that disobedience to the bishop of Rome, the successor 
of St. Peter, endangered one's entrance to heaven. On these 
grounds the king gave his decision in favor of the Roman 
school ! The decision carried with it, in course of time, the 
adoption of the whole Roman system, although it was not 
until 716 the Roman date for Easter was generally adopted in 
the North. " Even at the close of the eighth century the 
Scottish Liturgy was in daily, though not exclusive, use in 
York." * 

* Lingard. 



12 THE GENESIS OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH 



II. 

THE ANGLO-SAXON PERIOD. 

The Anglo-Saxon period of the Church in England extended 
from 664 to 1066. At the beginning of the period, there were 
seven Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, each having its own bishop, but 
with no ecclesiastical head over the whole Church. 

Northumbria and Kent, without consulting the great king- 
doms of Mercia and Wessex, agreed to recognize Canterbury as 
the Metropolitan See of England, and sent Wighard to Rome 
to be consecrated archbishop. He died while there, and the 
bishop of Rome consecrated Theodore, a Greek from Tarsus, as 
Archbishop of Canterbury. Tarsus was the birthplace of St. 
Paul, who is thought to have introduced Christianity into 
Britain. British Christianity was originally Greek, being 
closely connected with that of the South of France, which 
was settled by Greek colonists. 

Archbishop Theodore's administration of the Church was 
marked by great wisdom. A council of all the churches of the 
Heptarchy sat under his presidency at Hertford. Several new 
bishoprics were founded. A parish system was inaugurated, a 
portion of the tithes previously paid to the bishop being there- 
after assigned to the parish priest. Theodore was the organizer 
of the National Church. As the nations of the Heptarchy 
were at this time distinct and sometimes warring principalities, 
the National Church came into existence before the English 
nation. 

The property of the English Church was not received from 
the State, but was given by individuals for the good of their 
souls. Whatever ecclesiastical power the English government 
has acquired over the Church has been by force, and the 
property it has taken from the Church has been by fraud. 



THE ANGLO-SAXON PERIOD. 13 

Theodore not only organized the Church, but also introduced 
learning into England. " In a single century England became 
known as a fountain of light, as a land of learned men, devout 
and unwearied missionaries, of strong, rich and pious kings." 

Theodore, himself a Greek, founded a school in Canterbury 
for the study of his native language, and Greek copies of the 
New Testament were carefully made by English monks. 
" The eighth century is the golden age of the Anglo-Saxon 
period." Its two most noted scholars were Bede, called " the 
venerable," and Alcuin. Bede was brought up from childhood 
in the monasteries of Wearmouth and Jarrow. He made 
known to his Anglo-Saxon countrymen the teaching of the 
Church fathers, but his chief celebrity now rests upon a work 
probably least highly esteemed by himself, his ecclesiastical 
History of England. A touching account is given of the end 
of his life, by one of his scholars. On the eve of Ascension 
Day he bade the young scribe, who was taking down his trans- 
lation of St. John's Gospel, to write quickly, as he did not know 
how soon he might be called to his Master. He lay awake all 
night in thanksgiving, and in the morning continued his work, 
until he was told the Gospel was finished, when he peacefully 
sang the doxology and passed away. 

Alcuin, the other Anglo-Saxon scholar, made his college at 
York so famous as to attract students from the Continent. 
When on a journey to Rome, he met Charlemagne, who per- 
suaded him to remain in France. While there, he composed, 
in the name of his imperial master, the Carolinian Books, in 
which he argued against the image-worship practised in Rome 
and the East. 

The Anglo-Saxon Church was filled with missionary zeal. 
Chief among her missionaries was Winifred, or Boniface, who 
went to Germany, and in 738 was consecrated archbishop of 
Mentz. 

The Church suffered so severely from the invasion of the 
Danes, who burned monasteries and churches, and laid all the 
country desolate, that when Alfred became king he could 
hardly find a priest able to read. 



14 THE GENESIS OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH 



III. 

THE ANGLO-NORMAN PERIOD. 

William of Normandy entered England with a banner 
blessed by Alexander II., and his conquest rendered the 
relations of England and Rome more intimate than they 
had previously been. The bishop of Rome had, during the 
Saxon period, borne to the English bishops something the 
same relation as our presiding bishops bear to our foreign 
missionary bishops, or as the Archbishop of Canterbury bears 
to the colonial bishops of England. 

The eleventh century brought a marked change to the 
English Church. 

The Norman conquest of England began in 1066. Hilde- 
brand became Pope Gregory VII. in 1073. It had been the 
theory of the Roman Empire that it was to be universal, and 
that the emperor should be the ruler of the world. The Roman 
Church extended the theory so as to make the Roman bishop 
ruler of the Catholic Church, and the superior of the emperor. 
A fierce warfare was waged between Pope Gregory VII. and 
the German King Henry IV., who was also Emperor of Rome. 
The pope conquered, and Henry IV. was obliged to stand 
three days in the cold and snow, in the garments of a penitent, 
bareheaded and barefooted, before the castle-gates of Canossa, 
awaiting Gregory's pleasure to allow him entrance to his 
presence. The pope was not so successful with William of 
Normandy. The Conqueror was visited by a legate of Gregory, 
demanding that he should do homage to the pope, as suzerain 
of all European powers, and complaining of the non-payment 
of Peter's pence. William agreed to the payment of Peter's 
pence, /. e., a penny for each hearth, which he need not to have 



THE ANGLO-NORMAN PERIOD. 15 

done had he been better informed as to English customs. 
The tax had not hitherto been levied on the kingdom, but only 
on the king's private estates, and not for the benefit of the 
pope, but for the support of the English College at Rome. 
Homage to the pope was scouted at by William. 

" Homage to thee," he replied, " I have not chosen, neither 
do I choose to do. I never made a promise to that effect, 
neither do I find that it was ever promised by my predecessor 
to thine." 

Pope Gregory VII. was aided in his attempt to make him- 
self supreme in western Europe by the Forged Decretals. 
These were a product of the Dark Ages. A monk named 
Dionysius Exiguus made a collection of the canons of the 
Church and of papal decrees up to the year 525. The collection 
was enlarged in 635 by Isidore of Seville. The forged decretals, 
first quoted about 836, were professedly those of Isidore, but in 
fact interpolated by a ninth-century forger. In these forged 
decretals are quoted papal decrees dated as early as the first 
century. They contain also the so-called " Donation of Con- 
stantine," wherein the Emperor Constantine the Great granted 
to Pope Silvester the Empire of Italy, or the West ; the igno- 
rant forger supposing that the imperial dominions were confined 
to Italy in the fourth century as in the ninth. This instrument 
also recognizes the dependence of the civil power upon the 
ecclesiastical, which is separated by a whole heaven from 
historic fact, as existing in the fourth century. The font, in 
which it is pretended Constantine was baptized by Pope 
Silvester at the time when he presented this " Donation of 
Constantine," is still shown in Rome ; but the truth is Constan- 
tine was baptized on his death-bed in Asia. According to 
these decrees the Church of Rome is constituted head over all 
the churches by Our Lord himself. An ignorant age was un- 
able to discover that these forgeries were written in North 
German ninth-century Latin. Upon these forgeries the power 
of the Roman Church was erected. 

The Normans of England were great builders of churches. 
Many of the present cathedrals are of Norman origin. 



1 6 THE GENESIS OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH 

At first there were various Eucharistic Services in different 
parts of England, but the use of Sarum or Salisbury was so 
much superior to the others that it became the prevailing Mass, 
and from it our own Communion Service is derived. 

The Church's position at this time was a difficult one. It 
was fated to be either the slave of the king or the pope. 

Sometimes it would throw itself into the power of the pope 
to escape the king, and sometimes it would aid the king to free 
itself from the pope. Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, had 
to fight both king and pope. William Rufus, son of the Con- 
queror, had kept the see of Canterbury vacant three years, in 
order that he might enjoy its revenues. Becoming ill, he was 
frightened, and appointed Anselm archbishop. The king, 
continuing his dishonest practices, was resisted by the arch- 
bishop. On the other hand, the pope sent a legate into 
England as the superior of the archbishop (as Satolli now 
takes precedence of the Roman hierarchy in this country), but 
Anselm gave the pope to understand that the Archbishop of 
Canterbury had no ecclesiastical superior in England. 

In the contest between Henry II. and Thomas a Becket, 
the king's object was to enslave the Church to himself, while 
the archbishop fought for the civil freedom of the Church, but 
its subjection to the pope. A Becket had been the king's 
chancellor, and served him faithfully. The king wished an 
archbishop who should be his ally instead of an opponent, 
and accordingly appointed a Becket, who thereupon became as 
loyal to the pope as he had previously been to the king. 

A person tried for crime, in which a clergyman was im- 
plicated as plaintiff or defendant, was obliged to appear in 
the ecclesiastical courts. The law worked badly. The mur- 
derer of a clergyman, tried in the ecclesiastical court, only 
suffered the Church's penalties. A cleric, on the other hand, 
might commit crimes without number, and still be beyond 
reach of the civil courts. Henry demanded that, for civil 
offences,- ecclesiastics should be tried in civil courts. The 
archbishop opposed the king, who thereupon summoned a 
council of barons and churchmen, who passed the " Constitu- 



THE ANGLO-NORMAN PERIOD. 



J 7 



tions of Clarendon." By them the Church was freed from the 
pope, but enslaved to the king. They provided that in civil 
and criminal cases the clergy should be tried in the king's 
courts, and that in ecclesiastical trials appeals should lie from 
the archbishop to the king, that no bishop " or other exalted 
person should leave the kingdom without royal permission, 
that the revenues of vacant bishoprics should accrue to the king, 
and that he should have the nomination of all ecclesiastical 
dignitaries, who should do homage to him for their temporal- 
ities." 

In opposition to these provisions a Becket stood for such free- 
dom of the Church as it had possessed in Anglo-Saxon times, 
and as champion for these rights became the idol of the peo- 
ple. He escaped to France, where from his cell in Pontigny 
he launched excommunications upon the whole court faction. 
The bishops of York, Salisbury and London were on the side 
of the king. A hollow reconciliation was effected between the 
king and archbishop. A Becket returned to Canterbury, 
where he was murdered by four knights, instigated to the 
deed by a hasty and inconsiderate speech of the king. His 
death won success for his cause, for the king, in order to clear 
himself from complicity in the murder, not only resigned all 
customs and usages prejudicial to the Church, but also that 
in which he was clearly in the right, that clerics, for crimes 
against the State, should be tried in civil courts. Two years 
after his death Thomas a Becket was canonized by the pope, 
and St. Thomas of Canterbury became the most popular Saint 
in England. One hundred thousand pilgrims were registered 
at one time at Canterbury ; and in one year, while the offerings 
at God's altar were nothing, those at the altar of the Virgin 
amounted to £4, is. 8d., and those at the altar of St. Thomas, 
to £954, 6s. 3d. 

Stephen Langton, the next great archbishop of Canterbury, 
was consecrated in 1207. King John treated the Church 
tyrannically, and wrote an insolent letter to Innocent III., one 
of the most powerful of the popes. Innocent thereupon put 
the kingdom under interdict, forbidding the celebration of the 



18 THE GENESIS OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH. 

sacraments, and putting a stop to all religious rites, including 
the burial of the dead. 

The bishops of London, Ely, Worcester and Arras were, 
in 1209, authorized to pronounce anathema against him, which 
caused the desertion of many of his adherents. Every severe 
action of the Church was avenged by the king. At first he 
was disposed to place the clergy out of the protection of the 
law. When a man was charged with the murder of a priest, 
John said : " He has slain one of my enemies, let him go free." 
The year after his excommunication Innocent absolved his 
subjects from the oath of fealty. In 12 12 Langton went to 
Rome to complain of John's continued misrule, and was au- 
thorized, on his return to France, to pronounce the deposition 
of the king, and to invite Philip Augustus, king of France, to 
invade England. 

The relative situations of all the contending parties was now 
absolutely reversed. John surrendered his crown to Pandulf, 
the papal envoy, and received it back again as a gift from the 
pope. He did homage to the legate, and paid tribute for Eng- 
land and Ireland as papal possessions. Innocent took John 
under his protection, and, much to the indignation of the king 
of France, who had made great preparations for the invasion 
of England, forbade the execution of the project. 

Stephen Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury, also changed. 
He now stood with the barons of England, against the pope. 

The barons were deeply mortified by the surrender of the 
kingdom to the pope, and, as John continued his tyranny, they 
determined to compel him to keep the promise he had made to 
observe the laws of King Edward. 

The archbishop headed the barons, and at a meeting of the 
nobles he informed them he had found a charter of liberties 
granted by Henry I. and confirmed by Henry II. On this the 
bishops and barons determined to take their stand. 

The papal legate Nicolas opposed the movement, and the 
king in a rage swore that he would never grant liberties to the 
people which would make a slave of himself. Nevertheless, 
the archbishop and barons were successful in their opposition 



THE ANGLO-NORMAN PERIOD. 19 

to the king and his master, the pope ; and at Runnymede 
June 15th, 121 5, John signed Magna Charta, the first article 
of which declares " the Church of England shall be free." 

The provisions of Magna Charta have, in modern times, 
been observed in all particulars, save in its declaration with 
respect to the Church, which is to-day in bondage to the State. 

Pope Innocent III. on August 24th, issued a bull condemn- 
ing and annulling the charter and releasing all persons from 
obligation to observe it. He suspended Langton, and pro- 
nounced excommunication on those who refused to obey the 
king. Langton went to Rome, where, in a great assembly, the 
pope declared himself unreservedly for the king, and censured 
Langton severely for taking part with the barons and disre- 
garding his notice of suspension. 

Meanwhile the barons having in vain attempted to obtain 
redress from Innocent's "well-beloved in Christ, John the Illus- 
trious," offered the crown to the son of the king of France. 
The pope placed under interdict the city of London, which 
had taken part with the invaders. 

The opportune deaths of John and Innocent brought an end 
to England's disgrace. 

Langton returned, unforgiven, to confirm the charter in the 
name of the boy king, Henry, and finally wrested from Rome 
the promise that no legate should be sent to England so long 
as he lived. 



2 o THE GENESIS OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH. 



IV. 

THE REFORMATION. 

The papacy had overreached itself. The humiliation to 
which the pope had subjected King John antagonized the Eng- 
lish people. The opposition to Rome increased, until, in 1393, 
a statute was enacted, providing that, " whoever procures at 
Rome or elsewhere any translations, processes, bulls, instru- 
ments or other things, which touch the king, against him, his 
crown and realm . . . shall be put out of the king's protection, 
their lands and goods forfeited to the king's use." Edward 
III., whose reign filled one half of the fourteenth century, de- 
clared, with the assent of the bishops and nobles, that " neither 
John nor any other person could subject the nation to another 
power, without consent of the nation." 

The papacy was to overreach itself in several particulars 
during the thirteenth and following centuries. The papacy 
loved money. The pope required as the price of his consent 
to the consecration of a bishop the payment of a fixed sum, 
and also an " annat," or the first year's income of the bishopric. 
The funds of the English Church also passed to Rome, by 
what were known as " Provisions," whereby the pope provided 
a person to fill a benefice before it became vacant. By this 
means the most prominent positions were occupied by for- 
eigners, who never went near their flocks but only drew the 
revenues. Pope Gregory IX. in 1240 required the Archbishop 
of Canterbury and the bishops of Lincoln and Salisbury to 
provide for 300 Romans, and not give positions to any Eng- 
lishmen until provision was made for the Romans. In the 
reign' of Henry III. the revenue of the government did not 
equal the sum drawn by the foreign clergy. 

In the early part of the Middle Ages the monasteries exerted 



THE REFORMATION. 21 

a beneficial influence. They were schools of learning, and, in 
the midst of warlike nations, havens of peace and religious 
centres ; but at the close of the Middle Ages they had become 
places of ignorance, indolence and luxury, while the universities 
were the resorts of those who desired to become scholars. 
The friars, or brothers, who came at a later period, originally 
represented the spiritual life of the Church, but they too ex- 
changed their poverty for corporate luxury. They invaded the 
parishes of settled clergy, preaching and receiving confessions, 
under the special favor of the popes and in opposition to the 
protests of the parochial clergy. 

In 1440 printing was invented, and in 15 16 the New Testa- 
ment was published in English, which led to the discovery of 
the discrepancy existing between the popular religion, and that 
taught in the Scriptures. 

Purgatory, according to the teaching of the Middle Ages, is 
a place where pains are endured, differing only in their tem- 
porary character from those of hell. It was held that the 
merits of the saints are more than sufficient for their own 
salvation. Their superabundant merits, together with those of 
Our Lord, are, it was supposed, banked, subject to the pope's 
check, which he could draw for the benefit of the living and 
of the dead. Remission from a part or all of the pains of pur- 
gatory were called indulgences. Pope Sixtus IV., in 1477, 
declared that indulgences might be obtained which would save 
souls from the pains of purgatory. In 15 10, pope Leo X., in 
order to raise money with which to build the Church of St. 
Peter in Rome, offered indulgences for sale, which caused the 
explosion in Germany, resulting in the German Reforma- 
tion. 

The law of God, as interpreted by the Church in the Middle 
Ages, and now, by the Church of England, provides that a man 
may not marry his brother's widow. This Henry VIII., when a 
very young man, had been compelled to do. In after years he 
professed to have scruples of conscience as to whether it was 
right for him to be living with Catherine of Aragon. The 
pope was afraid to annul the marriage, because he was in the 



22 THE GENESIS OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH. 

power of the nephew of Henry's queen, the emperor Charles 
the Fifth. 

As a result of Henry's quarrel with the pope, Parliament in 
1530 passed an act forbidding application to Rome for relief 
from certain laws. 

The year following, the money payments claimed by Rome 
were disannulled. In 1533, all appeals to Rome were forbid- 
den. In 1534, Convocation decided that the pope by divine 
right had no more jurisdiction in England than any other 
foreign bishop. In 1539, tne Bible was circulated in English. 
The Cup was restored to the laity in the Holy Communion, 
and confession was made voluntary instead of compulsory. 
The principle upon which the Reformation was conducted in 
England was, that the meaning of Scripture is to be determined 
in accordance with the teachings of the Primitive Church. Yet 
Henry was no Protestant. He drew up a law called the 
" Statute in Six Articles," ruling (1) The truth of the doctrine 
of transubstantiation, and that all deniers thereof should be 
burned to death. Also (2) That communion in both kinds is 
not necessary. (3) Forbidding priests to marry. (4) That vows 
of chastity might not be disowned. (5) That private masses are 
necessary, and (6) That auricular confession is to be commend- 
ed. Disobeying or impugning any of these five last articles 
entailed, for the first offence, loss of goods, and for the second, 
death. Aside from the first five of these particulars, Henry's 
position was that of a Catholic without the Pope. 

In 1547, Edward VI., aged ten years, became king, and 
Hertford, duke of Somerset, lord protector. The duke was an 
ultra Protestant of the Calvinistic type. Cranmer, Archbishop 
of Canterbury, was a learned, but weak man, who let matters 
drift as they would, and was incapable of guiding or protecting 
the Church. In 1 549, the first Book of Common Prayer was 
ordered to be used instead of the Sarum Missal. In 1552, the 
second Prayer-Book of Edward VI. was published by royal 
authority alone. It was in accordance with the prevailing 
ultra Protestant tone, but never came into use. 

Positions of influence were held by foreign Protestants, who 



THE REFORMA TION. 23 

assumed an offensive tone of superiority. Of these the two 
chief were Peter Martyr, who held the divinity chair at Oxford, 
and Bucer who occupied the same position in Cambridge. 
The protector plundered the Church. He demolished two 
churches and the houses and chapels of three bishops to 
build a palace for himself. Westminster Abbey was only 
saved by the dean's gift to him and his brother of several 
manorial endowments. Church bells and Communion vessels 
of silver were seized by the government, which viewed with 
greedy eye the revenues of the bishops and appropriated them 
in various ways. The squire who had a living to bestow gave 
it to his gamekeeper or steward and pocketed the revenues. 
" The divinity schools were planted with cabbages, and the 
Oxford laundresses dried clothes in the school of arts." 

The people of England became so disgusted with the pro- 
ceedings of the leading reformers, that they hailed with delight 
the Princess Mary's accession to the throne, although she had 
always remained loyal to the papacy. The first parliament of 
her reign repealed the ecclesiastical laws passed in Edward's 
reign, and restored the Church to the position it occupied at 
the close of the reign of Henry VIII. 

A year after Mary became queen she married the cruel bigot, 
Philip of Spain. From that time to the end of her reign, 1554- 
1558, her rule was so blood-thirsty as to gain for her the title 
of " Bloody Mary." In her person the Church of England 
made its second trial of Rome, as it had tried Calvinism in the 
reign of Edward VI. The result was that it became possessed 
of an abhorrence of both Calvinism and Romanism. It would 
be Catholic, as the Church in the first and purest ages was 
Catholic. 

Elizabeth became queen in 1558, and on January 15, 1559, 
her coronation took place, with the celebration of the Mass, 
the elevation of the Host being omitted. Cardinal Pole, Arch- 
bishop of Canterbury during Mary's reign, had died within 
twenty-four hours of his cousin and sovereign. 

Matthew Parker was consecrated Archbishop of Canterbury, 
December 17, 1559, in Lambeth Chapel, by bishops Barlow, 



24 THE GENESIS OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH 

Hodgkins, Coverdale, and Scory. The account of the ceremony 
by eye-witnesses is preserved in the Lambeth register, and the 
manuscripts of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. Forty- 
four years after this event the Romanists originated the " Nag's 
Head Fable," according to which, Parker and other newly- 
elected bishops assembled at a tavern, where Scory made them 
members of the episcopate, by placing a Bible on their heads. 
The validity of Anglican Orders -has been acknowledged by 
such distinguished Romanists as Chas. Butler, Canon Tiernay, 
Dr. Lingard, and Bossuet. A Roman priest, the Very Rev. 
T. H. Estcourt, F. S. A., canon of St. Chads, Birmingham, 
lately admits " that it is very unfortunate that the Nag's Head 
story was ever seriously put forward ; for it is so absurd on the 
face of it, that it has led to the suspicion of Catholic theolo- 
gians not being sincere in their objection to Anglican Orders." 

That the English Church was done with Rome appeared 
from the severance of all intercourse with the pope, from the 
adoption of the Prayer-Book instead of the Missal, from the 
translation of the " Bishop's Bible," in 1568, from the required 
subscription by the clergy of the Thirty-nine Articles, from 
the charge made to the clergy not to " set forth or extol the 
dignity of any images, relics, or miracles," and many such like 
things. 

Paul IV., becoming pope in 1559, in vain made friendly over- 
tures to Elizabeth, even offering to sanction the Prayer-Book, 
provided the Church of England would acknowledge his 
supremacy. 

Meanwhile the English Church stoutly asserted it had not 
separated itself from the Catholic Church. " Jewel's Apology," 
in which the catholicity of the English Church was defended, 
was translated into nearly all the languages of the Continent. 
When Pius IV. invited Elizabeth to the Council of Trent, it 
was in the same terms as the invitations to the Protestant 
princes. The queen took umbrage at this, and in her reply 
objected that " an invidious distinction is made between me 
and such other Catholic potentates as have been invited to the 
council some time ago." The altar in the queen's private 



THE REFORMATION. 25 

chapel with its crucifix and lighted candles indicated her 
opinion that one might fight the pope to the death and still be 
fond of high ceremonial. The Eucharistic Office of Mary's 
reign was authoritative for seven months after Elizabeth came 
to the throne. When the Romanizing faction argued that the 
Church " had been planted within the realm by the motherly 
care of the Church of Rome," the queen retorted that there 
were bishops and priests within her realm when Augustine came. 

In 1570, the twelfth year of Elizabeth, Pius V. issued a bull 
of deposition against the queen. The bull also declares, " that 
those who adhere to Queen Elizabeth in the practices afore- 
said," i. e., the Reformation, " lie under the censure of anathema 
and are cut off from the unity of the body of Christ. 

Now was formed the Roman Catholic Church. All the way 
through we have been speaking of the Church of England. It 
was the " Holy Church" of Magna Charta. Up to 1570 there 
had been but one church in England. In 1570 — remember 
the date — 1570, the papal bull required all who were obedient 
to the pope to leave the Church of England, its cathedrals and 
its parish churches, its bishops and its rectors. 

The Roman Catholic Church in England was placed under 
Jesuits and French priests, over whom in 1 593 an archpriest 
was appointed. The Creed of Pope Pius IV., promulgated in 
1564, became the symbol of the new sect. Its liturgy, instead 
of that of the Church of England, was the Mass of the city of 
Rome. A new creed, a new liturgy, an alien priesthood meet- 
ing in secret conventicles the few people who seceded from the 
ancient church of the land constituted the Roman Catholic 
Church in England. Remember the date. In 1570, the twelfth 
year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, the Roman Catholic 
Church came into existence in England. This organization 
the Archbishop of Canterbury some time ago styled " the 
new Italian Mission." The Romanists were much exasperated 
at an expression which so precisely defined their true status. 
But one of their own number, the Jesuit Father Humphreys, 
has since boldly avowed : " We are a new mission straight 
from Rome." 



26 THE GENESIS OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH. 



V. 
THE AMERICAN CHURCH. 

From the English Church came the American Church. 
From the Roman Catholic Church in England came the Roman 
Catholic Church in America. 

The North American Continent was discovered June 24th, 
St. John Baptist Day, 1497, by John Cabot, sailing under the 
English flag. On this discovery England based its claims to 
the territory afterwards occupied by it in America. 

Had Columbus discovered America, this country would have 
been under the control of the Roman Church, and would now 
resemble South America, Mexico, and the Canadian province 
of Quebec. 

In 1606 the United States was born. In this year, James I. 
created by charter two companies, to whom he gave the sea- 
coast from the most eastern point of Maine to Wilmington, 
South Carolina, and the whole territory extending west to the 
Pacific Ocean. 

Of this territory the Church of England took possession by 
being first on the ground. From the eve of the feast of St. John 
Baptist, 1579, for six weeks, Francis Fletcher, a priest of the 
Church of England, said Morning and Evening Prayers for 
sailors and savages on the shores of Drake's Bay, California. 
To commemorate this event a stone cross has been erected 
at San Francisco, and accepted by the State. The site was 
presented by the park commissioners, and is upward of 300 feet 
above the ocean. The monument is observable from the city, 
the ocean and the Golden Gate, and will be known as the 
" Prayer-Book Cross." 

The dedication exercises took place Jan. I, 1894.* 

* " The cross is fifty-seven feet in height, and the column underneath the arms is 
thirty feet high and is built of three pieces of stone. The arms are fifteen feet in 



THE AMERICAN CHURCH. 27 

The first Indian convert on the Atlantic shore was the Chief 
Manteo, baptized at Roanoke, according to the Anglican rite, 
on the 9th Sunday after Trinity, 1587, and a week later was 
baptized the infant daughter of the governor, Virginia Dare, 
"the first Christian born in Virginia." In 1607, thirteen years 
before the landing of the pilgrim fathers, the Church of England 
people erected a church at Fort St. George, in Maine. 

The same year Parson Hunt, on the 3d Sunday after Trinity, 
administered the Holy Communion to the colonists of James- 
town. Their church had for its roof an old sail hung from the 
trees. Logs or stumps were the seats, the pulpit a bar of wood 
nailed to two trees. " This was our church," wrote the histo- 
rian of those days. Later, it gave place to one of cedar, in the 
choir of which, after prayers by Parson Buck, was convened the 
first representative legislature of this continent. Here, and not 
In the Mayflower, in Plymouth harbor, the year after, were laid 
the foundations of the American Constitution.* 

It was in old St. John's Church, Richmond, Virginia, the 
patriot churchman Patrick Henry cried : " Give me liberty or 
give me death." Washington was a communicant of the Church. 
The first Congress in Philadelphia, 1774, was opened with the 
Church's prayers, by the Rector of Christ Church and St. Peter's 
in full canonicals. Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of 
Independence, was a baptized vestryman, and to the end of 
his life a regular attendant at church. Richard Henry Lee, 

height and twenty-three feet across. The column above the arms is nine feet 
high. The dedication inscription is engraved on the column on the east side, and 
reads : 

" ' A memorial of the service held on the shores of Drake's Bay, about St. John 
the Baptist Day, June 24, 1579, by Francis Fletcher, priest of the Church of 
England, chaplain of Sir Francis Drake, chronicler of the service.' 

" On the west side of the column the space is divided into four tablets, with the 
following inscriptions : ' First Christian service in the English tongue on our coast.' 
' First use of the Book of Common Prayer in our country.' ' One of the first 
recorded missionary prayers on our continent.' ' Soli Deo Sit Semper Gloria.' 

" On the base the following is inscribed : ' Gift of George W. Childs, Esquire, of 
Philadelphia.' " 

* As Bancroft says : " The London company merits the praise of having aus- 
picated liberty in America." 



28 THE GENESIS OF THE AMERICAN CHURCH. 

who offered the resolution declaring the Colonies free and inde- 
pendent, was a Churchman. Fifty-five of the signers of the 
Declaration of Independence were Churchmen. There is a 
striking likeness between the constitutions of the American 
Church and the American Republic. This similarity is due to 
the fact that they were framed within two years of each other, 
and by much the same men. Two-thirds of the framers of the 
Constitution of the United States- were Churchmen. 

In view of these facts I conclude with this thesis : The 
Holy Catholic Church of the Creeds is the Church founded by 
Our Lord, and by Him destined to spread throughout the world. 
The proper name of the Catholic Church in each country is 
the name of the country. In Corinth its name, according to St. 
Paul, was " The Church at Corinth." In England the name of 
the Catholic Church is " The Church of England." As long as 
the thirteen original colonies belonged to the British crown 
the Catholic Church in this country was the Church of Eng- 
land. When the colonies became free and independent the 
Catholic Church assumed the name Protestant Episcopal, but 
its proper and rightful title is, The AMERICAN CHURCH. 



PR A YER. 29 



PRAYER. 

Used at the Raising of the Flag referred to in the 

Preface. 

O Almighty and Everlasting God, King of kings and Lord 
of lords, who hast constituted the services of angels and men 
in a wonderful order, and having divided the human race into 
nations, appointed the archangel Michael prince over Judah, 
as guardian and protector, continue, we beseech Thee, the 
favor Thou hast ever shown to the United States of America, 
since Thou hast made us a nation : and may the guardianship 
of Thy most powerful angels secure to us the respect of the 
peoples of the earth. Bless the flag, now to be raised heaven* 
ward, that it may ever wave as the symbol of a nation exalted 
by righteousness. 

And forasmuch as righteousness can only come through the 
gift of the Holy Ghost sent down upon Thy Holy Catholic 
Church, on the day of Pentecost, which Church Thou hast 
made the way of salvation, bless with abundant blessings the 
Church of America. May it, by the power of the Holy Ghost, 
walk answerably to its high calling and leaven the nation. 

Bless all who love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity and 
truth, and prosper the works undertaken by them for the wel- 
fare of the people. 

As we look up to the Flag may the blue of its union direct 
our thoughts to the higher blue of the sky, reminding us 
that heaven is our home, in which the righteous shall shine 
as the stars in the firmament. Let its stripes speak to 
us of the Saviour's virgin purity, and of the red wales 
in His sacred body, who now livest and reignest with Thee 
and the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. 
Amen. 



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